We awoke with just a smidge of a hangover to views of the cruise port and adjoining Cité de la Mer exhibit from our balcony.

Finding cruise port information or things to do in Cherbourg if you’re visiting via cruise online was not particularly easy; either it’s a port not often visited by cruise ships or the people who visit don’t find a lot to write about. We thought this was odd as we’d taken a look at maps of the area and spotted quite a few places in Cherbourg that had attracted our attention: a hill-top fort, a bunker, medieval ruins, and several musuems were all the sorts of places of interest we like to take a look at when we’re visiting a new city and we saw there was a microbrewery there too to satisfy our desire to hunt down local drink. We hadn’t wanted to book an excursion during our cruise stop in Cherbourg mostly because our past record with French ports has been less than amazing and there was always the chance it would be cancelled but there was also the factor that the excursions offered – Bayeux for the tapestry, Normandy beaches, Mont St Michel – all involved fairly considerable travel times. The local attractions would do, we decided.

But we made one crucial mistake with our planning.

We were arriving on a Saturday with intentions to see historical monuments and museums early on, leaving the afternoon for drinking and shopping. We had assumed – because this is how things work at home and France isn’t that far away or that culturally different from us – that the places we wanted to visit would be open. They were not. Cherbourg’s tourist attractions don’t seem to want any tourists on a Saturday morning and, it turns out, if you want to do anything cultural or educational during lunchtimes at any point in the week then you’re out of luck too. What we discovered very late on in our planning (i.e. a few days before we cruised to France) was that the places of interest in Cherbourg we wanted to visit would not open for the first six or seven hours we were in port. Not only that, had we actually arrived on a weekday rather than a Saturday we would have found everything closing up between about 12:30 and 14:00 each day too. This is utterly baffling to us. Had this been the south of Spain where heat plays a part and siestas are common then we might have expected it. This is northern France. Why do these places not have the staff on hand to keep somewhere open throughout the day and during the morning on a Saturday? At the very least, why weren’t steps being taken to take advantage of visiting cruise ships?

This left us with few options. We knew that La Cité de la Mer would be one possibility; maritime exhibits and aquariums are things we like to see but we figured most people not taking a cruise excursion might hit that first so, as it would be right next to where Arcadia docked in Cherbourg, we would leave that to the last thing to see in order to avoid the crush. Our visit there is covered in the next cruise review post. We could have risked going to the microbrewery early and doing shopping before trying to hit something of cultural interest but with anything interesting opening just three hours before we’d need to be back on board and not wanting to go into the city, come back to hit the maritime building, then return to find a museum before turning around again to hit the ship all on the back of hopefully fuzzy heads we rejected that.

Ultimately, we decided that we would walk for a few hours to see if we could find something not necessarily on the maps or just interesting to photograph, get our drinking done, then hit Cité de la Mer early if necessary and just get back on our floating home. We were disappointed that it appeared we wouldn’t really be making the most of our time in Cherbourg but the main thing was we’d be exploring somewhere new anyway.

We left the ship, walked through the old and impressive terminal building, and headed south out of the cruise port area.

Reaching Pont Tournant in around five minutes we crossed over the bridge towards the main part of Cherbourg. This area was very attractive, offering up some lovely views across the harbour with its perfectly still water providing some gorgeous reflections of buildings in the city and boats anchored all around.

On the waterfront side of Cherbourg’s main area of shops and other businesses we spotted a bust of someone not recognisable to us. I always try to take photos of these statues as it provides something of interest to look up later. This turned out to be the Colonel Bricqueville Monument. Armand François Bon Claude, Count of Bricqueville, was a cavalry officer serving in Napoleon’s army who took part in campaigns in Prussia, Poland, Spain, and Russia. The statue was erected in 1845 and originally had two bronze reliefs on it as well but these were melted down by the Germans towards the end of World War II.

We followed the main road along the harbour, Quai Caligny, northwards then westwards past the Catholic Church of Basilique Saint-Trinité where it became first Place Napoléon (easily identifiable from the statue of Napoleon on a horse erected in 1858) and then Rue de l’Abbaye.

We weren’t completely walking on a whim here. Maps had shown that along the appropriately-named Rue de l’Abbaye there appeared to be ruins of an abbey, Abbaye du Voeu (Abbey of the Vow). Information about the place was pretty sparse but we could see it had been an abbey (obviously) as well as military barracks and a hospital, and it had a museum. What we couldn’t find out from the lack of details such as opening times was whether the museum would be accessible but we guessed that at the very least we’d be able to have a look around the ruins themselves. Alas, Cherbourg’s rather lacking appeal to tourism had other plans and the ruins, like everywhere else we were thinking of visiting, were closed until mid-afternoon. We could get reasonably close to its exterior and took a few photos but exploring inside was not to happen.

The walk from Cherbourg harbour to the abbey was about two kilometres and there was no indication that there was anything else of interest in that direction so we turned around and headed back towards the main part of the French city. Our target destination now was Parc Emmanuel Liais, location of a museum we knew would be closed but where we hoped access to the park and gardens would allow us to break up the views of buildings and main roads that had accompanied most of our walk to then.

The park was lovely. Helped by some extremely pleasant weather the greens of the garden popped out vibrantly against the clear blue sky. The spots of sun and shade were welcome as was the tranquility away from the white noise of cars passing in the city. If you’re ever in Cherbourg and there’s nothing else to do then this park is worth ten minutes to wander around and soak up the atmosphere.

Emmanuel Liais was an astronomer and botanist. He went to Brazil in 1858 to witness a solar eclipse but ended up staying on until 1881 doing mostly astronomical research (a Martian crater is named after him and he discovered a comet). Returning to Cherbourg he became mayor and imported numerous plants from Brazil and Asia which became part of the collection he bequeathed to the city on his death.

The museum to Emmanuel Liais was closed, as expected (thanks Cherbourg), but knowing his history we’re sure it would have been interesting to take a look at. The maps we’d seen hadn’t shown that there was another large building in the park and this turned out to be a botanical greenhouse hosting some of the specimens Liais introduced. Incredibly, it transpired that this was actually open at the time we were there. Despite us not seeing another soul inside it as we explored its small but interesting interior it should be noted that this building closes for lunch.

I was particularly taken with the concrete and glass, modernist design elements of the greenhouse, both inside and out.

We decided we would take a little bit of a wander to see if anything popped up to interest us before we’d visit the microbrewery we were looking to sample wares within. Our walk through Cherbourg’s streets took us past a couple of pieces of street art and into a square briefly where a market was taking place. We weren’t there to take back cheese or other goods but it’s possibly something to consider in light of the fact that it did constitute an actual thing to explore in the city on a Saturday.

I did rather like the posters we saw advertising try-outs for Cherbourg’s roller derby team, the Cherboobs.

The microbrewery and bar we were interested in was L’Eldorado. In fact, we were initially very interested in both it and the venue directly opposite it on Rue Tour Carrée called Le Bayou as between them they seemed to serve a large number of interesting-looking ales though only the former establishment brewed their own. As it was, the latter location doesn’t open until 17:00 on a Saturday (I can tell you’re surprised by this) so it was just L’Eldorado that got our business. The brewery makes four ales; a blanche, a blonde, an ambrée, and a brune. We lean towards the darker, maltier ales so one ambrée and one brune later we were sitting in the compact booth seats in the window, watching the world go by, watching one woman spend the best part of ten minutes trying to reverse her car into a parking space twice the size of her vehicle, and enjoying the local alcoholic produce.

In truth, we loved that we had ales freshly made on the site but there was an underlying taste to both of our drinks that we couldn’t put our finger on – almost molasses-like if I had to come up with something – and we decided one would be enough. Having finished our ales, pleased that we’d tried them even if they weren’t exactly to our tastes, we retraced our route around Cherbourg’s harbour and headed towards Cité de la Mer.

Our visit to Cité de la Mer in Cherbourg will be covered in the next post (and we did enjoy that a lot (update: Cité de la Mer)). Cherbourg does have a few areas that would ordinarily interest us – the fortress with the liberation museum, the nearby battery, the abbey ruins, a few other museums and art galleries too – but as a city it’s simply not very friendly towards a casual, daytime visitor from a cruise ship, particularly on a weekend. A cruise cynic might suggest that fits in nicely with the cruise lines’ business model as it promotes the purchase of excursions but it’s a strange stance to take from Cherbourg’s businesses and tourism office. A shame really, and the city can only really be rated as okay as a result and certainly not somewhere we’d be massively bothered about visiting again.

As you approach the main building have any bags on you open for inspection. You’re in a foreign country and the people there will speak their own language before they usually switch to the one you’re familiar with (if they can) and a blank look as you try to replay what you heard in your head hunting down key words you might remember from GCSE French at school will only lead to a repetition of the phrase and gesturing before your wife slaps your arm and says “Let him see inside the camera bag dumbass!”

Inside the main building you’ll discover a lot of exhibits on show without you needing a ticket. These will be submersible craft for the main part that have played key roles in exploration of the undersea kingdom. While these might provide some distraction they weren’t what we were there for. In this area there are also toilets and a café.

Paying for your ticket lets you exit the main building into the enclosed external area where a number of other pieces of maritime history are located and where you can gain access to the Titanic exhibition, the aquarium, and the nuclear submarine. Of these three things it was only the latter two we were interested in during this trip; we’re always fond of aquariums and if we can set foot on a historic vessel then we always will too.

Le Redoutable Nuclear Submarine

The main thing we wanted to see at Cité de la Mer was the submarine museum Le Redoutable. It is the largest and only nearly-complete ballistic missile submarine open to the public and we are always keen to do the firsts, lasts, largests, longests, etc. whenever we travel to places around the world.

An audio guide available in several languages can be picked up as you scan your ticket in at the entrance to the submarine and it provides one of the most informative descriptions of the places you explore as you make your way through the impressive vessel. One thing to note, though, if you’re the sort of person who likes to ignore the audio guide and wander around on your own is that the passageways through Le Redoutable are narrow, often only permitting one person to pass and this, coupled with the guide often telling you to stop and look at certain things, means that you won’t really be able to progress any faster than those with the guides ahead of you on the boat (not ship). You may as well use the guide and you won’t be sorry that you did.

Commissioned in 1971 and decommissioned twenty years later, Le Redoutable was the first of the Redoutable-class submarines constructed for the French Navy. She was fitted with 16 ballistic missile launchers and being in the section where each of the missiles could be independently launched was very impressive. Each missile tube had its own controls, its own computers, and seemingly anachronistic brass tubes to ensure communication could be maintained even in the event of failures there. The audio guide went into some detail about what and how long it took to launch a nuclear missile (something no submarine has ever done), making a mockery of most of the movies or books that might have implied some rogue person might be able to do it on a whim. Did you know that a compressed air bubble is in the tube with the missile so that during launch it expands and keeps the missile completely dry until it ignites its rocket upon leaving the water?

Le Redoutable was a very functional boat for the most part with little room given over to the niceties of life under the water for months on end. The submarine produced its own fresh water and oxygen, could manufacture and replace any part, needed to be able to cope with compression and expansion of the hull of several centimetres when attaching fittings, and had plenty of protection against heat, noise, and, of course, radiation. The reactor section of the submarine had been removed (obviously) but had it been still there and operating it could have powered the entire city of Cherbourg. A walkway allowed you to wander through where the reactor had once been.

My favourite part of Le Redoutable was the very, very 1970s decor of the meeting room area. Looking like something straight from UFO this really appealed to my love of that period’s style.

The audio guide tour of Le Redoutable takes about 35 minutes so you can add on another five or ten to that to cover stepping through doorways, taking photos, etc. Dropping off our guides and stepping away from the submarine we were afforded views of our cruise ship, Arcadia, showing just how close to the attraction ships dock before we made our way to the next point of interest in Cité de la Mer. I can see our balcony in a couple of these photos.

Aquarium

As I’ve already mentioned we are keen on aquariums and you can almost guarantee that if there’s one in a city we’re visiting then there’s a good chance we’ll end up paying to take a look around it. Like everything else in Cité de la Mer the aquarium was on a grand scale, obviously designed to cope with a huge number of visitors at a time. Because of the time that we visited it, perhaps, the place was mostly empty and this suited us perfectly. The aquarium building is set over two levels with a number of marine artifacts and pieces of accompanying information along with some interactive components but it was really the sealife that we’d come to see. There’s something so very soothing about staring into tanks and watching the varied creatures swimming or crawling around.

There weren’t a huge number of tanks but the cleanliness of the glass was superb and the variety of sealife was enough to get a good look around and enjoy what was there. One tank did extend over the two floors of the aquarium building and it was possible to get partially underneath looking up. This produced an unsettling effect in considering just how much weight of water there was poised above you, but unsettling in a good way and one of the highlights of the visit.

Prior to the aquarium in Cité de la Mer the last sealife centre we’d been to had also been in France – La Rochelle Aquarium – and that had been more of what we consider a traditional aquarium. The large tank was impressive but the small number of tanks and apparent waste of space, perhaps simply because we’d timed our visit to an exceptionally lucky quiet period, left us feeling satisfied but not blown away by the exhibit in Cherbourg.

A quick show of our cruise cards as we exited Cité de la Mer allowed us to enter the old cruise terminal and make our way back to the ship.

Conclusion

If you’re visiting Cherbourg then Cité de la Mer is easily the most interesting thing to see with the added bonus of having the most chance of it being actually open. As people who love naval history the price of admission was worth it just to explore Le Redoutable for us. Getting to see numerous other undersea vessels as well as an aquarium and the chance to explore a museum dedicated to the Titanic too should make this a no-brainer decision should you find yourself in the French city.

When we’d booked the cruise aboard Arcadia we’d left it late and so selected a balcony guarantee grade. If you’re not aware then what this means is that rather than choose the room from those apparently available we would be assigned one by the cruise line based on unfilled reservations for travel agents. We would get a balcony at the very least but the location would depend on what was left. It turned out that we had a forward/midship, port-side balcony, not somewhere we would have chosen for ourselves; we always favour starboard side and as far forward as possible. Had we been where we would have picked on the ship then our view from Arcadia would have been mostly out to sea but as it was we got to see another cruise ship at anchor off the island’s capital city, the Cruise & Maritime Voyages cruise ship Magellan, as well as tender boats from our ship.

The sunlight reflecting off Magellan’s white hull made it almost glow against the slightly overcast background of the Channel Island.

But our luck wasn’t limited to just being able to take a look at another cruise ship from our balcony. As I enjoyed the gentle warmth of the morning and the relaxing sight of the water undulating slightly I became aware of occasional flashes of something in the waves. Initially ignoring them as possibly just wave tops breaking I then noticed one of Arcadia’s tender boats seemed to be following the wave movements. With immense joy I suddenly realised there were dolphins and called my wife out from the room to watch.

For the next half hour we were transfixed, observing two distinct groups, perhaps one pod split up or possibly two, with the bulk of the dolphins further out from us and the subject of close monitoring by the ship’s tender boat and another couple of vessels that came in for a look, and a pair or three dolphins that were considerably closer to the ship, occasionally passing by almost right beneath where our balcony overlooked.

While we’d seen whales migrating off Argentina and a single dolphin had jumped alongside our tender boat as we departed the Falkland Islands we’d never seen pods of dolphins before. The combination of being allocated a balcony on the wrong side of the ship (for us) and accidentally not charging the phone overnight came together nicely to grant us a brand new experience. Cruises are already incredibly relaxing ways to travel, offering you plenty of chances to see the natural wonders of the sea and the landscapes you pass as you travel from port to port in luxury but when wildlife makes an appearance too you get a bonus opportunity to feel humbled that’s almost indescribable.

The morning had started very well for us – if you’ve read the previous post then you’ll already know that we had the utter joy of experiencing some unexpected dolphin-watching from our cruise ship balcony – and with the weather appearing to be bright but not too hot (just how we like it) we took the tender boat from Arcadia across to the mainland and started our walk. Our previous visit to St Peter Port had taken us generally south of the city along the cliffs and exploring the castles and other fortifications and museums in that direction. For this trip we headed due north along the shoreline instead. Checking maps we knew that northwards and slightly inland there were some gardens; we didn’t know how interesting they would be nor whether there would be anything else to see there other than greenery and flowers but it was a general target to head towards.

Candie Gardens

The gardens we were heading for were the Candie Gardens.

[The] restored Victorian Candie Gardens offer spectacular views across St Peter Port harbour and our sister islands of Herm, Sark and Jethou, along with a rare example of a late 19th century public flower garden. They are home to the oldest known heated glass-houses in the British Isles, which date back to the late eighteenth century. In the gardens, aside from the beautiful flowers, lawns, and fish ponds, you will find a museum, art gallery, and a cafe housed in a Victorian bandstand.

At the entrance there was a handy map of the gardens’ layout and we decided from this that we would walk the upper garden area first then come back through the lower garden before returning to our somewhat anticlockwise wander around St Peter Port.

Entering the upper garden we were drawn firstly to the statue of Victor Hugo (unveiled in the gardens in 1914) and then to the view over the waters off St Peter Port that showed both our cruise ship Arcadia and the CMV cruise ship Magellan at anchor.

The reason for Victor Hugo’s statue being on the island was that he spent 15 years living there in exile. During his time on Guernsey he wrote Les Miserables, among others.

Passing the bandstand we then noticed that the Guernsey Museum was open (for some reason we hadn’t thought it would be) and it was hosting a Geek Weekend. As somewhat geeky people ourselves we had to take a look and spent an engaging half an hour looking through the rooms that had been set up to show off model railways, amateur radio systems, wargaming, fantasy clothing, and collections of Star Trek spacecraft. We spent quite a while talking to the railway expert even though it’s not something that really interests us normally; there’s something infectious about listening to someone talk about what they love, though. Because there were quite a few families with young children around I put away my camera and didn’t take any photos. I don’t have a cast-iron rule about taking pictures when children are present but generally speaking, and certainly if indoors rather than out in public, I lean towards not triggering someone’s unfounded fear and protective instincts in favour of a quiet life. In addition to the rooms for the geeks we checked out the main museum areas too, some of which was very interesting indeed, especially the parts describing local folklore and the island’s own language.

Back outside we then took a walk through the lower gardens. While the upper gardens were mostly just lawn and borders the lower gardens were an explosion of flowering colours.

Exiting Candie Gardens we started heading southwards as there was nothing apparently of interest north or west from our location. St Peter Port is on a hill so we were some way back from the shore and the main part of the city and quite high up at this point. We took a meandering route that set us towards another garden on the map, the Sunken Garden, but this turned out to not look that exciting as we approached so we made do with a couple of photos and carried on our way.

We found ourselves at the top of the Clifton Steps and decided that this would be a good place to descend towards the centre of St Peter Port in search of something interesting. The steps were pretty steep and I certainly wouldn’t want to walk up them very often but they did provide some occasional lovely views out across the harbour.

Golden Lion Pub

At the bottom of the steps it had been our hastily-made plan by this point to head off in search of Victor Hugo’s house since we’d seen the statue in Candie Gardens and knew it wasn’t far away but it had just turned noon and we found ourselves right by the Golden Lion pub which was just opening. A quick glance at each other and we decided without speaking to pop in for a quick drink before carrying on. This turned out to be a good move on our part as the bar staff were incredibly friendly and knowledgeable about local ales, ciders, and gin, all things we like even when they’re not local but which we will go out of our way to experience when we’re travelling somewhere new. Not only did we get to see and hear about all the local offerings we tried them all too thanks to third-pint sampling paddles. Sitting outside in the sunshine initially our paddles attracted some attention from other visitors to the island and we tried to persuade them to try some drinks inside too but I’m not sure that they did. We used our samples to choose our favourites for a larger drink and have that inside once the heat trap outside the pub became too much and it was here that we realised that Victor Hugo’s house was closed so… we stayed for one more round. And another.

St Peter Port Harbour

Eventually, we decided we’d take a quick look along the St Peter Port harbour area before taking the tender boat back to Arcadia. Whether this was a regular occurrence or not I can’t say but there was a market taking place by the waterfront so we wandered up and down it for a few minutes before spending some of our Guernsey money change on a locally-written-and-illustrated children’s folktales book referencing some of the local creatures of mythology we’d read some details of previously in the Guernsey Museum in Candie Gardens. Just to be clear, the book was a gift for my niece. We then headed to where we would need to pick up the tender, stopping for some photos of the boats in the harbour as there’s something very appealing about boats in calm waters under clear blue skies.

All that then remained was to board the tender and commence the 10-minute ride back to our waiting cruise ship.

At some point I’m sure we’ll visit St Peter Port and the rest of Guernsey on a day other than Sunday and while it’s true that we didn’t get up to an awful lot on this visit we had seen and done plenty on our previous visit to the island’s capital back in May so feel perfectly fine with this. It would be nice to see what other attractions there are in the city during a normal working day and Victor Hugo’s house is still on our list of places to visit plus there are plenty of places on the rest of Guernsey we haven’t even touched on yet.

Embarkation at Southampton was a very familiar affair. Living in Portsmouth allows us to leave packing and driving along to the cruise terminal fairly late, queue for a little while as CPS sort out the parking for the car, then wander in with our hand luggage (as it was just a short trip), grab a card to allow us to queue briefly to get our cruise cards, pass through security, then board. We know what to expect in terms of CPS parking times and rough travel conditions so our timing is pretty much spot on at this point for boarding and entering our cabin precisely when we’re supposed to.

When we booked our cruise on Arcadia we left it fairly late as we were trying to work out how to use up what remained of our holiday allowance in the year. Subsequently, for the first time since our second cruise many years back now we didn’t choose where we would be on the ship (where we wanted wasn’t available), opting instead to pay for a guaranteed balcony and leaving it to chance. The main pros of doing this are that you know you’re going to get a balcony and you’re going to be paying the lowest price. The cons, of course, are that the balcony could be anywhere; fore, aft, mid, high, low. You might be near where the smokers congregate. You might be beneath the running track or pool. For a weekend cruise we took the gamble and it turned out absolutely fine. Our actual grade was a couple above the lowest class of balcony and we were situated just forward of midships on the port side. We prefer the starboard side but as you can read in our dolphin encounter this turned out to be a very fortuitous allocation.

Cabin D72

Our cabin on Arcadia was D72, an EB grade classed as a Deluxe Balcony. A little wider and a little shorter with just a minor layout difference but in all other respects comparable to a mini-suite on a Grand-class Princess ship (such as our Star Princess room in 2016). A curtain separated a seating area from the bed and the bathroom contained a bath and shower rather than simply a shower unit. Storage space was more-or-less identical to any other ship although a small cupboard over the sofa in the seating area was a novel addition. This would be a good cabin to have on any cruise with the only thing to be aware of being the single UK plug socket available by the dressing table. For some reason there were two European sockets also available but for a UK cruiseline this seemed an odd configuration. P&O provide tea and coffee-making facilities in their cabins which we’re still not keen about but each to their own and it’s not as if we’re forced to use it.

The balcony depth was somewhere between a Royal-class balcony (too shallow) and a Grand-class balcony (fabulous) making it just about adequate (i.e. you could turn a chair to face outwards and sit on it, just). The view was perfectly fine and the lifeboats just below, partially obscuring the promenade deck, did not spoil the scenery at all.

Bars On Arcadia

Now, while we’re keen to review cruises and share information about the ships that isn’t our primary reason for getting on them; like most sane people we’re there to enjoy ourselves and relax. On a longer cruise we can do both things because there are sea days and plenty of opportunities for heading off, exploring. With this Arcadia cruise only having two full days aboard and both of those being port stops there was less chance (and less inclination if I’m being honest) to check out every lounge, every bar, every type of entertainment, etc. in detail. Prior to muster, though, we took a quick wander up to the top deck to have a nose at one of the two pools up there. This was the centrally-located Neptune Pool, capable of being covered by the Skydome apparatus and the pool we determined to be the quieter of the two on that deck. Another pool, Aquarius, is at the aft of the ship but its exposed location, large deck area for sunbathing, and loud sound system meant it was absolutely rammed with people when we briefly visited it after our stop in Guernsey. Aquarius appears to be the party pool and Neptune is the more relaxing pool. We’re not party people. The downside to Neptune is that there are limited seats and loungers around and no easy access to the deck above (no steps up from around the pool area) but it would certainly be our preference as a place to swim on a longer cruise on Arcadia.

We had time for one drink before muster drill so walked through the East Bar (not serving drinks until the evening) then forward to the Crow’s Nest.

Muster for us took place in the Ocean Grill speciality restaurant, a place we’d booked a table for that first evening prior to embarking our cruise as we’d chosen a Select Price cruise with P&O and had some on board spending money to play around with. Even though we couldn’t choose our cabin we still opted for the Select Price option in order to make sure that for the following two nights we would be able to dine when we wanted and not when decided by Arcadia’s staff. We’re not fans of fixed dining times. The muster was pretty reasonable as P&O musters go although I’m still going to take the opportunity here to recommend that P&O (and everyone else) adopt the Princess Cruises approach of not needing to take the life jacket with you; it means the stairs aren’t packed afterwards with people returning the safety equipment to their cabins and proper cruise drinking can commence immediately.

Muster done we had a decision to make: the sailaway party by the Aquarius pool or grabbing some drinks at wherever was open. You might remember that we’re not party people so a tour of the three bars in close proximity on F deck was our very easy choice.

First up was the Rising Sun pub. It’s odd to admit but P&O are not our first choice for cruising as, if we’re travelling abroad, we like to get away from things we consider British. A foreign holiday is better if it’s culturally and socially different as much as possible from what we could get at home; it just makes the break better. That’s mostly why we don’t really like seeing kettles in cruise ship cabins. All that said, we do like the pubs they have on P&O cruise ships and the Rising Sun on Arcadia is a really nice example of one. I’d go even further and say that Arcadia’s pub is the best pub on any of the four P&O ships we’ve cruised on.

However, in what has fast become a P&O cruising tradition where we’re concerned, yet again the pub did not have the first beer I tried to order. I know, I know, it’s a first world problem, but cruises aren’t super cheap, the ship had literally docked in Southampton that morning, and there’s just no excuse for not having all the things you’ve seen fit to print up in your bar menus actually on board at the very start of a cruise no matter how short it is. On the plus side it was just this one drink that wasn’t available making our Arcadia experience significantly better than our cruise on Oriana earlier in the year.

From the pub we headed through the gallery, past the atrium, and aft to the Spinnaker Bar. A bell and model ship decorated this otherwise very quiet location.

By the atrium was a long, thin bar area called Intermezzo that we then had a couple of drinks in before heading off to shower and change for our meal. We had some nice views of the Isle of Wight that we were passing by on our starboard side but the most memorable thing about this bar was the manner in which the Martinis we ordered turned up. Call us old-fashioned but we like our Martinis in Martini glasses. The drinks were fine, of course, but for many drinks the drink is an experience that includes the glassware and we felt this did change it somewhat and not positively.

Ocean Grill Speciality Dining

Our first evening on Arcadia saw us try the speciality dining at Marco Pierre White‘s Ocean Grill restaurant. Food on cruise ships is generally very good so the speciality restaurants have to put in a little more effort to warrant parting with your money. Was the Ocean Grill worth the extra? This is a tricky one to say for certain. For us, we weren’t blown away by the food with one exception and on one of the subsequent nights on the short cruise they had a Marco Pierre White menu in the main dining room which included several of the elements we’d paid extra for but for free, putting a bit of a dampener on the experience too. You want to feel you’ve got something you couldn’t have got otherwise and that was only partially true here. The food was all cooked perfectly and tasted fine but it overall just lacked a little something difficult to describe. This isn’t a unique observation of the Ocean Grill on Arcadia as we felt the same about the Epicurean on Azura last year too. We’re possibly just spoilt.

For starters I had the Cured Gressingham Duck Carpaccio and my wife had the Crevette Cocktail

The main course for my wife was the Fillet of Bass while my main course, the Pork Cheek and Pork Belly, was the standout course. Had everything else been as tasty, as good-looking, and felt as special as that one course then we’d have no hesitation in recommending the Ocean Grill dining experience on Arcadia.

Dessert was cheesecake for my wife and chocolate tart for me. The cheesecake felt like another case of style over substance – it looked impressive in its bowl but this ended up making it awkward to eat properly – while the tart seemed to be not far removed from what you’d expect in the main dining room anyway. Both fine, just both unspectacular.

Some chocolates (that were also presented in the main dining room) and a quick visit and a smile for the camera from the head chef rounded off our Ocean Grill evening on Arcadia. We’re glad to have done it and on a longer cruise on the ship we might even do it again as there are plenty of other dishes to try and see if they would impress more but we’d possibly try to arrange it for the same night the similar menu was being offered in the ship at large so as to not feel quite so aggrieved at the extra cost.

One final gripe about our speciality dining night: my cruise card was taken twice, the first being when we bought wine (as expected), the second being… for no reason we could think of. More importantly, it wasn’t returned – something we didn’t realise until later – so I had to get a replacement from reception. This process was very swift, though, so well done P&O there.

We concluded our first night on Arcadia with a couple of drinks in The Globe, listening to the live band then the DJ, and watching some of our fellow passengers get up and dance. I’d like to say this part of the cruise was uneventful but another P&O staple made an appearance here in the form of completely the wrong drink being delivered.

Ports

For this cruise we visited Cherbourg (see: Arcadia, France posts) and St Peter Port (see: Arcadia, Guernsey posts). Disembarkation at both ports was simple and efficient and different in each case. Cherbourg simply involved walking off and into the French city while St Peter Port required taking a tender ashore, a process as simple as taking a ticket and waiting in the very attractive theatre until our number was called before being led to the boat.

We didn’t choose this cruise because of its itinerary in particular (although it was nice to actually dock at the French port we were supposed to, a first on any cruise for us) which was just as well as Cherbourg on a Saturday and St Peter Port on a Sunday aren’t exactly overflowing with activities for casual tourists. The weather was good, though, and we knew mostly what to expect on each day and weren’t disappointed at all.

Main Dining Room

Arcadia’s main dining room is split over two floors, a feature present in quite a few ship designs but a first for us. Its large size and openness made it very attractive indeed – probably the prettiest room we’ve dined in on our cruises – but our experiences on the two nights we ate there were very different affairs. While the final night was without fault the previous evening had been bad enough to lead us to see if there were any speciality options instead (no luck; we’d been handed a leaflet for Sindhu’s, a restaurant we’ve never tried on P&O to date, and phoned to book soon after to be told it was booked up, making us wonder what the purpose of the leaflet had been). That bad experience was the formal night and started with the longest wait to be seated we’ve ever had followed by some shocking service on our table for ten: two people were handed courses before they’d finished the ones before while I entered a now-traditional P&O invisibility period and ended up being offered no bread nor any water (much to the amusement of the people with whom we were seated). I did eventually get a glass of water when everyone had a top-up to get their second glass but this was simply not good enough for a four-course meal. Our waiter couldn’t have been more indifferent to our table if he’d tried. If we hadn’t had similar poor service on previous P&O cruises we’d have made more of a deal of it but we’ve started to accept that they’re just not quite good enough in this area of cruising and it’s one of those things. Food, as mentioned earlier, was very good.

Gameshow

We’re not ones for cruise ship entertainment usually but we did find ourselves in The Globe one of the evenings just as a gameshow based almost exactly on The Chase started. Called The Pursuit, it was well produced and hosted and sated our desire for a bit of trivia that we’d not been able to fulfill to that point. I was particularly pleased with our seating location which produced some great light and shadows for photography during the show.

Prior to the gameshow taking place we’d been in The Globe along with one other couple (not together; they were seated away from us) and we’d had a drink. Finishing our drink we’d looked around to see if we could get another. We counted seven stewards in the lounge (so staff almost outnumbered passengers 2-to-1), all of whom were as far from us as possible and talking to one another. We were in clear view of them and decided to see how long it would be until one of them noticed our empty glasses. After nearly ten minutes of sitting there and looking at one another with raised eyebrows and shakes of the head I then pulled out my phone and started a timer running then left it on the table. That did the trick and we were then served inside a minute. Not good enough by far, P&O.

Miscellaneous

The following photos were taken at various points over our short cruise on Arcadia.

The art gallery and various bits of artwork around the ship were very nice and a lot of it suited our tastes; some of the best we’ve seen at sea.

A prominent feature of Arcadia should be the colourful glassware at the top of the atrium. Something that shouldn’t be so prominent are buckets to catch leaks from air conditioning units. There were an awful lot of these around the ship in lounges and corridors (we saw at least half a dozen) but hopefully this is just a temporary thing until the equipment is fixed properly.

We did finally get to have a drink in the East Bar on one of the nights when we took one look at how packed the Crow’s Nest was and thought better of trying to find a seat. East was practically empty and had some lovely views across the pool at night but there is a doorway to the right side of the bar through which the staff members would periodically walk and every time resulted in a flash of intense white light from the room the other side flooding the otherwise subdued, atmospheric bar. Our recommendation would be to sit to the left of the bar if you can.

We also finally did spend a little time by the Aquarius pool at the ship’s aft on the final morning as it was the only place with seats where we could have breakfast before departure. The buffet offerings on Arcadia were better than we were expecting from our past cruises with P&O so another plus point foodwise there.

Arcadia Cruise Summary

I know there’s a lot of moaning in this review of Arcadia but there’s no point reviewing something if you’re not going to pick out the bad points as well as the good; the world doesn’t need another person claiming everything is fantastic and you’ll never get the cruise lines to improve their offering if they don’t get honest feedback. P&O still have a problem with consistency of service and in our opinion they need to just ramp their speciality dining offerings up a notch, though that’s partly the fault of having such good quality offerings in the main dining room.

We liked Arcadia a lot. We’re still Grand-class fans more than we are Vista-class but the ship design had a lot to recommend it. She’s at the lower end of the size of ship we’d like to take a longer cruise on but we’d have no problem at all taking one on her and wouldn’t hesitate to recommend her if asked.